Warrensburg Farewell

Many years ago, the poet traveled to see his fiancee, with whom he had recently broken with, Psyche. She was a graduate student at Central Missouri State University. He drove for two days to see her, to try and make a reconciliation. He failed, ultimately, and on his return trip he pulled off the road and wrote this poem, a threnody to that lost love, named for the city in which the university resides, Warrensburg, Missouri.

Warrensburg Farewell

we will probably never
meet again-this side of the grave.
that is why, so tenaciously, I save
the memories we shared.
we cared so much - together
we were a force even nature feared -
but striving as one, we found we had
cleared separate and saddened trails.
we failed to cling as once
we had. the bonds dried and broke -
and when our farewells we spoke
we knew all along it was for life.
we had challenged fate for a chance
to love - but the wind was cold
that blew between us. it told
us I would never call you wife.


William F. DeVault. all rights reserved.